New Delhi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said an old, blurry photograph of three Buddhist stupas of Baramulla found in France has revealed Kashmir's glorious past dating back nearly two thousand years.

In his monthly Mann Ki Baat radio address, Modi said large human-made structures were discovered in Jammu and Kashmir, a development which "will fill you up with pride" regarding its cultural and historical heritage.

For years, people had been seeing some tall mounds in Baramullah's Zehanpora, he said.

These were ordinary mounds, and no one knew what they were and one day, an archaeologist noticed them, he said.

The prime minister said the archaeologist began to observe the area carefully and these mounds appeared somewhat unusual.

Following this, he said, a scientific study of these mounds began and drones were used to take photographs from above, and the land was mapped.

"And then some surprising things started to emerge. It turned out that these mounds weren't natural. They were the remains of a large human-made structure," he said.

Meanwhile, Modi said, another interesting connection emerged. "Thousands of kilometres away from Kashmir, an old, blurry photograph was found in the archives of a museum in France.

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"Three Buddhist stupas were visible in that photograph of Baramulla. From here, time took a turn, and Kashmir's glorious past was revealed to us. This history dates back nearly two thousand years," he said.

Modi said the Buddhist complex in Zehanpora reminds us of Kashmir's past and its rich identity.